Revolutionary Days

Father Gapon

ThatFather Gapon is anagent-provocateuris a surmise that would seem
to be borne out by the fact that he is a member and one of the ringleaders of
the Zubatov society. Furthermore, the foreign newspapers, like our own
correspondents, note the fact that the police deliberately allowed the strike
movement to spread as widely and freely as possible, and that the government
generally (and Grand Duke Vladimir in particular)wantedto provoke
bloody reprisals under conditions most favourable to itself. The English
correspondents even point out that the energetic participation of the
Zubatovists in the movement could only have been of especial advantage to the
government under the circumstances. The revolutionary intelligentsia and the
class-conscious proletarians, who would have been the most likely to provide
themselves with arms, were bound to keep aloof from the Zubatov movement, to
give it a wide berth. The government thus had its hands free to play a winning
game. The demonstration, so they reckoned, would be made up of the most
peaceful, least organised, and most back ward workers; it would be child’s play
for our soldiery to handle them, and the proletariat would be taught a whole
some lesson; an excellent excuse would be furnished for shooting down anybody
and everybody in the streets; at Court the victory of the reactionary (or Grand
Ducal) party over the liberals would be complete; the harshest repressions
would follow.

Boththe English and the conservative German newspapers directly ascribe such a
plan of action to the government (or to Vladimir). It is most likely true. The
events of the bloody Ninth of January confirm this only too well.But the existence of such a plan by no means rules out the possibility that
      Father Gapon was anunconsciousinstrument of this plan. That
    there is a liberal, reformative movement among certain sections of the young
    Russian clergy cannot be doubted; this movement has found its spokesmen both
    at meetings of the religio-philosophic society and in church
    publications. It has even been given a name of its own— the
    “New-Orthodox” movement. We cannot, therefore, flatly dismiss
    the idea that Father Gapon may be a sincere Christian Socialist and that it
    was Bloody Sunday which converted him to the truly revolutionary path. We
    are inclined to support this idea, especially since Gapon’s letters written
    after the massacre of January 9 declaring that “we have no
    tsar”, his call to fight for freedom, etc., are facts that speak for
    his honesty and sincerity; for it could not possibly be part of the duties
    of anagent-provocateurto agitate so powerfully for the
    continuation of the uprising.

Howeverthat may be, the policy of the Social-Democrats in regard to this new
leader was self-evident: to maintain a careful, guarded, sceptical attitude
towards this Zubatovist; in any case, to participate vigorously in the
initiated strike movement (even though it was initiated by a Zubatovist); to
popularise energetically the Social-Democratic views and slogans. As appears
from the letters printed above, these have been the tactics followed by our
comrades on the St. Petersburg Committee of the R.S.D.L.P.[1]“Cunning” as the plans of the reactionary Court clique may
have been, the realities of the class struggle and of the political protest of
the proletarians acting as the vanguard of the whole people have proved
infinitely more so. That the plans of the police and the military have worked
against the government, that out of the Zubatov movement, which served as a
minor cause, there has emerged a great and extensive revolutionary movement
embracing all Russia, is an established fact. Despite all police snares and
stratagems, the revolutionary energy and the revolutionary instinct of the
working class have asserted themselves with irresistible force.

[1]The letters mentioned by Lenin came from a Bolshevik in
St. Petersburg and were published inVperyod, No. 4, January 31 (18),
1905, under the heading “Letters of St. Petersburg
Social-Democrats”.